New Wave Outpost Forum

"Magic"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xD4jZQqTa4A

Hey Max - The Signal and The Noise is much better .. Magic leaves me kind of cold ... sounds too much like the rest of the "product" around, i never would guess it was SM .. this one however... good stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mK6LVCj_dRY

Agree with you 100%.

Well, I ordered mine. Got the CDX/LP/7" package once I found out the 7" of "Magic" bundled with that has a non-LP B-side ["Direction of the Heart"] that appears only there. Getting that fact was like pulling teeth [and failing] from simpleminds.com. Dream GIver [fan site} had the goods on it.You'd think that if one was charging £30 for a bundle like that, one would lay out what its exact content was…but you'd be wrong. I sat out the horrifying [to me] acoustic album/live album era. Let's see if they can get back up on the rock horse.

I normally embargo tracks from new albums I'm interested in, but today, I listened to the two tracks that were provided as DLs when purchasing "Walk Between The Worlds." From what I heard, I expected "Magic" to be far worse. The worst of modern cyberpop as typified by the last Duran Duran album, but what I heard, while shaky to start with, sounded like some of the poppier side of the band that I liked so much on "Cry." It got better as it went on and certainly aced Duran Duran's last attempts. Not bad. I can live with it easily. A succinct 3:20 pop song certainly beats bloated, anthemic stadium rock, though it's not the first thing I'd want from Simple Minds. "Signal + The Noise" was far better. A touch of the old "Sons + Fascination" DNA was present there and I liked the watery tone of Burchill's solo. This one was a great song that immediately grabbed me with strong lyrics; not the typical SM fare. The new album sounds like it will satisfy on the heels of their least satisfying record [Acoustic], so I'm relieved. I will say that the production/mix seemed to be very muddy. No Bob Clearmountain this time! I don't know what's going on there.

My package arrived last week and I've been compulsively listening to the CDX ever since. A bit of a shoegaze vibe to it. Eight solid tracks and the bonus cuts on the CDX have at least on classic "Silent Kiss" among the three. Since 2002, each Simple Minds album has seen incremental improvement from the previous one to the point where this one makes the last one sound poor… and I loved it three years ago.